Get it buzzed....

Raynham has been asking for short hair for about a year. Contrary to most girls her age, she does not have long, flowing locks. She won't sit still for brushing, pony tails or clips and if she does ask for any hair accessory it lasts about 2 seconds before it is ripped out. All done with that. This aversion to hair fuss seems funny considering how much of a princess, girly girl our little Princess Fiona is (yes, they still call her that at school and everyone at my work knows her by that name too!).

The hairdresser has been reluctant at best to give her the hair cut she wants. She has been giving her short bobs but doesn't want to really cut it short. We figured it was the "Mommy isn't here and she might freak out" concern of the hairdresser dealing with Dad telling her to cut it short. Apparently so, based on her repeated questions to Drew yesterday - "Are you sure your wife isn't going to come here and yell at me tomorrow?". Raynham requested the clippers but Dad vetoed that and instead went short, VERY short. Raynham picked her cut from a magazine and finally, they convinced the hairdresser to cut it. She looks like a pixie and LOVES it.

Strangely, she told me that her hair was just like momma's. Odd since my hair is past the shoulders at this point. She clarified though - like momma's on the 'puter. Yes, my hair used to be very short. I am sure it will be short one day in the future. But for now, Raynham has the short hairdo and looks so grown up I nearly cried. The hairdresser is safe though.... It looks fab!

Galen skates to a Shut Out!

Galen was goalie when his Tyke hockey team played at the first intermission at this past Friday's Bulldogs hockey game and he scored a Shut Out! No goals on Galen! Of course, ALL THREE COMPLETE Tyke teams were one the ice at once. That is nearly 60 kids chasing the puck in an insane mob. The puck barely moved, neither goalie got any action. It was hilarious. He should get more action when he is in the net for a real Tyke game this coming Friday.

The ROM's Dinosaur Exhibit

Yes, this exhibit was everything we expected it to be. The Dinosaurs at the ROM are awesome. I've been to the Natural History Museum in London and I was a fellow at the National Museum of Natural History at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington. My wife has also been to the American Museum of Natural History in New York. I've visited dinosaur displays in Calgary, San Diego, and Edinburgh to name a few. None compare to what the ROM has put together. If you read this blog and you find yourself near Toronto, be sure to visit. The Dinosaurs are getting the most press, but of equal magnificence is the new Gallery of the Age of Mammals. The two exhibits blend into each other very nicely and the biology and evolution is excellent. The displays, reading points, and lighting are subtle and incredibly well done. On display are very rare specimens, including holotypes, plus some remarkable developmental series for some of the dinosaurs. I especially like the clear presentation of which parts of each dinosaur were original and which were cast. The latter was a remarkable minority. Overall, the display of specimens in very much complimented by the architecture of the Michael Lee-Chin Crystal.

Galen had high expectations for this exhibit but it surpassed them. His mind melted before he made it 15 feet. He'll need another 6 or 7 visits to absorb it all. Raynham was stunned by the size of the dinosaurs, particularly the massive Barosaurus, but especially liked all of the "baby" dinosaur specimens. There were a remarkable number of these, from egg to adult.

Cross-posted to Shifting Through Science.

toddler birthday catch 22

A classic toddler Catch 22. Raynham is so excited about her upcoming birthday party that she can help behaving quite badly, to the point where she is risking losing her birthday party.

she may be in Australia, but...

she must be better

You can tell your daughter is better when she is back to ignoring everything you say. Of course, the boy is now tossing his cookies, so it is one up and one down.

toddler insanity

Yes, Raynham is home sick today. She has a mild fever, runny nose, and cough. Nothing very bad, but enough to keep her home. Despite being a stay-at-home dad, I actually get very little time individually with my kids. They are mostly together and love playing with each other. I'm the nice looking servant man there to attend to them. However, I'm getting the full day with Raynham while Galen is at school. I was more than a bit nervous about this as I've been worth less than a spec of dust to her for a few weeks. Dad is on the out, mom is everything. Raynham and I have not been getting along, but today she has been great. She is not sick enough to slow down her play and I'm cool today. We are having fun. However, it has been some time since I've had six hours of straight toddler play time. Hence the appended picture. Note my necklaces and earrings. Sigh.

Oh, the weather outside is frightful....

But I am warm in my new snowsuit.

The weather has finally dropped and is more "Canadian winter" than it has been. We are a cool -13C/8F today and the walk to school is not pretty. With the windchill, it is sitting around -22C/-8F. Luckily, we solved our snowpant fight and I got some new ones so only my face is really cold on the walk.

The weather here is about what it is in Green Bay WI, where my mom's beloved Packers lost in OT last night. Whether you are a cheesehead or not, you HAVE to love Favre and his team playing in the cold. I am greatly disappointed it won't be a Patriots-Packers final. I am not sure who I would have cheered for. Spending much of my adult life in New England makes me a Patriots fan but I have great admiration for Favre and would have loved him to get a Superbowl at this point in his career.

As for Hamilton, if we could just get some snow out of this for sledding and the local outdoor ice rink formed, all would be good.

he shoots, he scores!

Tyke hockey is going well for Galen and today was a great day as he got his very first goal, off his own rebound! Yea Galen! He is very proud and the game was 5-5 draw. The exciting news is that his team plays a scrimmage between first and second period this Friday at the Bulldogs Game. Better yet, he will be in goal for the game!

Freeverse. I'm a fan.

I know, it is kind of sad. I'm a (nearly) 40 year-old gamer. Mostly I play FPS games, but I have to admit that some of the best games out there come from FreeVerse. I can't tell you how many times I've played the strategy game Solace. And Hordes of Orcs was great! My old G4 Powerbook could barely handle it, but Legion Arena was a good game. And now they have put out Commander - Europe at War. This feels a lot like the old Avalon Hill board games. Hey Stuart, go buy a Mac.

If I was a good predator...

For Christmas, we received no less than two copies of the DVD series Planet Earth, I guess indicating that we are science/nature hounds as biologists aught to be. I have to admit, I have always LOVED nature shows and I believe part of what made me a scientist is my early addiction to David Suzuki's "The Nature of Things" and Mutual of Omaha's "Wild Kingdom". I can remember watching them avidly as a young child and thinking what they showed were cool (even if Wild Kingdom was much of a sham- I didn't know it at the time).

The kids are watching Planet Earth with me and LOVING it. Galen is full of ooohs and ahhhs over the images. Raynham has a running commentary on the babies and the predators. She must come onto my lap when the predators arrive on the scene. They are universally bad for going after the babies, in her eyes. I tried to explain the concept of no predators=too many prey=starvation and all babies die but she wasn't buying it. It started with the wolves going after the baby caribou and has continued for everyone with a couple of notable exceptions. The snow leopard was perfectly fine for going after the mountain goat because it had a baby to feed (guess those wolf babies don't deserve food) and when it comes to non-mammals, pretty much anyone can eat whoever they want. Baby fish, birds etc don't deserve the same level of sympathy. In the end, each predator-prey encounter is complete with a long story of how if SHE were the predator, SHE would be a GOOD predator and NOT EAT THE BABIES. What would she eat? Other food. Not babies. Raynham is rather vague on what constitutes appropriate food for a hungry wolf but it is definitely NOT the baby caribou.

I ready for my nap

I've waited nearly 3 years to hear the phrase, "I'm ready for my nap", and today I got it. Raynham was on her second post-lunch, pre-nap meltdown when she said this with tears running down her face. A new level of self-awareness and self-management has arrived. Yahoo!

The Earnest Rock Star

My folks got me the Apple iLife software for Christmas and one of the programs in it is GarageBand. This is a music making tool, to which Galen has taken quite a fancy. The feature he likes the most is Magic GarageBand, where you pick a genre of music and then pick up to five instruments that play a pre-defined tune. Here is a tune Galen made up, called Shooting Star. Well, we went through the various genres of music and made up about a dozen tunes, with names like Shooting Rocket, Penguin Rocket, and Rock Start Galen. Don't ask me how he comes up with the names. Apparently Shooting Rocket is called that as it sounds sad and it would be sad if you were in a rocket far away from your family.

All this was fine, until we started to work on the tune editor. Galen changed the tempo and mixed in other instruments. Then he discovered vocal recording and we ended up with Shooting Star Remix. My goodness, the boy is an earnest singer. Just listen to the vocal track. This kid cracks me up.

My Little Pony, a trip to the hospital, and a new ParentHack

Readers of this blog might be familiar with our daughter's propensity for putting things up her nose. Well, this Christmas was no exception. Raynham got a great set of My Little Pony toys, which had been right at the top of her Christmas list. Nine ponies with all the fixings. Including beads for necklaces. Now, Joanna and I don't get to sleep in very much. The day starts shortly after 6 am, but when at Grandma and Grandpa's house, we get to sleep in while the kids wake up Grandpa. No joy this day as we were awoken but a teary daughter who had a bead up her nose. We were not happy parents. Off to the local drop-in clinic we go with visions of the last visit - use of long, bent tweezers and half the hospital staff holding her down. Instead, we get there and after a very short wait, a nurse is looking up Raynham's nose. Noticing how small the bead is, she introduces us to what has to be the ultimate ParentHack. While Raynham sits on her mother's knee, the nurse tells Raynham that Daddy is going to give her a big kiss. Dad dutifully plugs the free nostril, asks Raynham to open her mouth, and blows sharply into her mouth. Out flies the bead out of the other nostril, spinning across the floor. Who needs tweezers? The cranberry was even smaller - we didn't need that struggle!

Raynham spent the rest of the day repeating, "I didn't like Daddy's big kiss". Kind of reminds me of Galen at this age telling everyone he met, while covering his rear with his hands, that he did not like how the doctor took his temperature. Now whenever we catch her going for the nose, we ask her if she wants the big kiss. Heck no! Maybe we found a key to solving this behaviour.

This all just confirms my long held belief that there is nothing better in the world than an experienced nurse. They don't teach this stuff at medical school.

Disclaimer: Don't try this at home! If the object is too big, you could blow out an eardrum!

Wiimote Lightsaber Attachment

As if there was any argument, but this is why we need a Wii.

How to organize your Lego bricks for efficient building

From Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories

If you spend any time at all with Lego, then the sight above is probably a familiar one: a giant bin full of assorted Lego bricks and parts. As a kid, this was about the pinnacle of my organizational skills (hey, they're in a box, right?) but I'm sure that in aggregate I wasted several years of my life pawing through boxes like this trying to find the next piece that I needed...

Read the Full Post Here

LEGO Indiana Jones

LEGO is trying to capture my heart. Last year they added the AquaRaider series with awesome submersibles, then they resurrected the classic space series I played with as a kid as the new Mars Mission. Never mind the 3104 piece Imperial Star Destroyer. Now they have introduced Indiana Jones LEGO! I gotta have it! Oh wait, they haven't have they? Yes, they also have a Barbie-like LEGO line. I'm doomed.

blog split

Since Distracted in Hamilton is 95% about family life and the trials of raising kids, I've spun off all of my science blog posts to a new home at Shifting Through Science. Besides, claiming this blog was from a stay-at-home dad and work-at-home bioinformatician does not really apply since Distracted Mom is making at least half of the posts.

American Thanksgiving and Christmas 2007 Photos

The big benefit of having lived in America so long is that we now celebrate both Thanksgivings! Our Christmas 2007 Photo Set includes photos from Thanksgiving as well as our Christmas celebrations. The photos also introduce our new family member - Oink the Guinea Pig.

Happy New Year to All!

growth spurts

Do you have any idea how hard it is to get anything done or get your children out of the house when they are asking for food every 60 minutes? I'm spending the bulk of the day in the kitchen!